


direction.

by Anonymous



Category: Vinland Saga (Anime), Vinland Saga (Manga)
Genre: Bickering, Brother/Brother Incest, M/M, Scent Kink, Sibling Incest, Torgrim's recurring pseudo-hotwifing fantasy, clothed handjob
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-04
Updated: 2020-08-04
Packaged: 2021-03-06 02:01:05
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,764
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25715452
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: "The trust we share cannot be bought with silver!""And that's the truth, brother!Depending on the sum."Torgrim fails to give a direct answer, but it goes unnoticed.
Relationships: Torgrim/Atli (Vinland Saga)
Kudos: 3
Collections: Anonymous





	direction.

**Author's Note:**

> Kept thinking about that exchange.... He's definitely joking. Probably. @vinlandsaga on twitter for more brocontent👍

Firelight, showing through the fabric of the tent they share, is good enough to see by some evenings, in the minutes before the sky fades to full dark. The tent's not meant to block out light, after all. Work starts early each morning, with the dawn if not before. Still, it's better than a farmer's life, and many hands make lighter work.

This evening Torgrim has the chance to look at the sword he lifted a few days ago, off a fellow who must've been richer than he looked. Fallen on hard times, maybe, judging from his clothes. That was why no one else bothered checking the ratty scabbard at his waist. Torgrim wasn't expecting much himself when he tipped it over, most of his concentration on picking out the next body to pick over. Then a glint of gold at the corner of his eye.

"You going to take that thing to bed?"

"I just might."

Atli's quiet for a while, digging his elbow into the knot that's been troubling Torgrim lately. Sometimes he imitates the grunts that Torgrim lets out, but tonight he's silent. Torgrim notes this only absently; the light's fading fast and he has an idea—childish, perhaps—that if he really burns this sword into his brain, he might see it in his dreams, too.

"What if you had to pick?"

"Wha?" The gold goes into a nifty kind of swirl where it hits the hilt, Torgrim can never remember the name of it. Along the blade it runs up a hollow in the middle, most of the way to the tip, then stops where the hollow stops, like a long vein. There's a word for long veins too, in some places, but that doesn't matter much so long as you know how to aim for them.

"Me or the sword, which would you pick?"

"What kind of question is that?"

"Depends on your answer."

"Who says I have to pick?"

"I don't see how it's that hard." Atli's getting antsy.

"I'd rather have both."

"But if you could only have one!"

"Says who?"

"Says me."

Torgrim, rather tired of the back-and-forth and having set the sword onto his folded day-clothes, very carefully, turns and pins him. He goes down easy, onto his back, and waits to be turned and fitted into a gentle hold with Torgrim at his back. Exactly where he likes being. There's more than a little pout in the set of his muscles tonight, though.

"You skinny little shrimp. You think you can make me do anything?" Torgrim slips a thumb into the hollow of his brother's inner thigh and starts to rub comforting circles.

Hands on Torgrim's wrist, not holding him back but working his fingers nervously into the palm, Atli growls softly, almost to himself. "Don't I give you everything?"

"More like you love taking it."

"Not everyone gets all this from his brother." Atli gasps at the _squeeze_ when Torgrim's hand moves forward. "I-I just don't see what else—if you still can't pick—"

"Come on." Torgrim presses his hips in close. "You're worth any sword."

"You should answer faster, then."

"It's a silly question. Of course I'd rather have both, it's simple math."

Like a dog with its teeth in a coveted piece of meat, Atli refuses to be distracted by logical thinking. "If you can't answer a silly question, what's that make you?"

"Smarter than you, I reckon. You know I've got to sell it to the first merchant who can pay fair price. Let me have some fun with it!"

Atli pauses. He's squirming with enjoyment, trying to get Torgrim to give in and start riding him. But he pauses, now. "Sell it?"

"Of course. It's just gold plate. A gold bar's gold all the way through."

"But—" a little half-hearted wiggling— "you're not using it? An expensive sword like that?"

"How can I fight with a sword with you behind me using an axe?" Torgrim gives his ear a nip. The idiot. "The movements are all wrong. We'll start bashing each other in the head."

Atli gives a last couple of twitches before subsiding into his arms. "Oh."

"Stupid!" Torgrim says, right into his ear. "At least get jealous of a woman."

"Don't shout at me. You like _things_ so much. That's what you've always got your hands all over."

"'Course I like pretty things. I grew up looking at you every day."

"Shut up." A little snort. "Meanwhile you haven't touched me in weeks."

They're in each other's laps most nights and mornings, taking care of all the little grooming tasks a man has to go through if he wants to be part of polite society. That's not what Atli's thinking of, though. Even if most wives would be satisfied with that kind of closeness, with both parties heading into their mid-thirties.

"Weeks, really?" Maybe time's been slipping away from him.

"Two weeks." Vibrating with renewed indignation, Atli gives his wrist a squeeze.

"Two! That doesn't count as 'weeks'." Torgrim gives him a squeeze back, round the waist, and starts stroking him again, slower this time.

"It's more than one."

"If you can't go two weeks without getting fucked at your age, we've got bigger problems on our hands. Two busy weeks."

"Not so busy you can't find the time to look at your spoils of war."

"Why should I be looking at you, when I can find you by the stink?" Sensing a possible misstep, he adds, "And I like when you stink, so don't start."

"I like when _you_ stink." Atli grinds back into him; a real slow, practiced move that could put a whore to shame. It nearly forces a sound out of him, and he's had twenty years of practice keeping quiet.

"And you're worried about being replaced." Torgrim's hand speeds up. "Pretty little tease like you could get anyone he likes." Atli grunts, the verbal equivalent of a sharp elbow, and Torgrim adds quickly, "Fine, fine."

Not the right time for that one. Just some regular attention tonight—even if he has to bite the inside of his cheek to kill the thought of a big crowd of bruisers drooling over his baby brother. Who'd cut all their pricks off before letting anyone but him inside—he bites his cheek again, harder. Breathes in the sweat on the back of Atli's neck. He can tell from the changes in breathing when Atli's going back to a fantasy, and Atli can tell when he's doing it. Tonight's not the night to be thinking about anyone else.

It's not a bad thing, the scent of sweat after a man's worked a full day. Some of the band switch over to single tents when the weather's warm so they don't have to fall asleep smelling anybody else. Their own fault for not having a brother. Or maybe it'd be like this with anyone, so long as your own sexual awakening began the exact moment he started to stink like a man after a day in the sun. Either way, Atli smells _almost_ just like the odor that's going to accompany Torgrim himself until Saturday, but with a little bit of himself mixed in. It mixes together pleasantly, in Torgrim's personal opinion, although others have voiced the opinion that they could at least stop doubling the stink by standing next to each other every second of the day. Not everyone can have good taste.

By Friday, true, they might be a little sour, but so's everybody else. It's what living does to you. Most nights, though, it just brings back lots of nice memories of being together. Working, killing, fucking. And lying around fondling each other, which is somewhere close to fucking except they can both do it to each other. A nice compromise.

Some nights just the scent of a day's work is enough to get them both in the mood to do a lot more sweating. Even if the immediate post-battle rush fades without them needing to sneak off together, there's something about the smell that brings it back. Something thick and salty in the sweat that makes the blood go hot all over again. When Torgrim wakes in the morning with a slight hangover and looks at his little pile of personal loot with a blankness in his head as if someone else left him a gift overnight—those are the mornings when he doesn't need to pick through his memory or his trousers to know there's laundry to do.

Atli's hand squeezes round his wrist like a vise. "You're thinking about _things_ again."

He's good at this, but not perfect.

"Thinking about plundering _you_ , actually," Torgrim informs him, waiting for his hand to be returned.

A moment of silence. Then Atli releases it. "Fine." His tone is a bit too satisfied.

If Atli has a fault, beyond the occasional slow moment, it's that he's a disgustingly spoilt, demanding brat. But it's Torgrim's fault as an older brother for spoiling him and liking it, and he keeps it to their private life for the most part.

"All this to tell me you like being my property." It's almost enough to make a man worry, having a little brother like this. Torgrim would worry, if it wasn't so much fun.

"Only in bed." But he relaxes. On his knees in spirit if not physically. Torgrim gives him a little kiss behind the ear to make sure there are no hard feelings left. That's the nice thing about Atli. He always likes being steered onto the right path.

"You happen to own my favorite sword in the world." He gives it a squeeze, feeling for the loose skin on his brother's balls as well as he can through the thin tunic. "After mine, of course."

Another nice thing about Atli is how his little waist fits perfectly under Torgrim's arm when they're lying like this. Like he was made to get felt up on darkening summer evenings, with just the tent between them and the stars. Everything about him fits nicely into the spaces of Torgrim's body, and his spaces are just the right size for Torgrim to fit into. Sliding into an expensive set of custom-fitted armor must feel something like this.

"It's just nice having it be you."

That's what Atli says afterwards, his voice thick and his fingers loose on Torgrim's wrist. Torgrim pulls his hand away gently to start tucking their sleep-shirts into the front of their trousers, covering the wet spots until morning.

"Wouldn't have anybody else," he murmurs back.


End file.
